


The Cat Cannot Feel Duty

by redsnake05



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Animagus, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Transfiguration (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 07:08:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11527122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redsnake05/pseuds/redsnake05
Summary: The Animagus transformation occurs at the cellular level, but it would be a mistake to think it is purely physical. A story about duty and service and the haven of uncomplicated feelings.





	The Cat Cannot Feel Duty

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Hoggywartyxmas 2016 for jean_doe_27

A stray shaft of moonlight found its way into a gap in Minerva's curtains, and she woke up as it played across her face. She loved the silvery gleam of the night sky, but not when it woke her in the middle of the night. She rolled over and endeavoured to fall asleep again, with the blankets bunched up high around the back of her neck.

She drifted, not quite asleep, her imagination providing irritating images of the moonlight wavering around all over her bed. She knew she would have to get up and close the curtains properly, now that she had woken. There was no point delaying the doing of one's duty, her father said, but Minerva had never quite been able to translate his rule into instant obedience. It was always cold at night in the manse, and she knew the floor would be freezing even through her bedsocks. 

Minerva lay still a little longer. She knew she could close the curtains using magic, and the idea tempted her. It would be so easy to visualise them closing, to twirl her fingers and see them shut and extinguish the light, but she knew that magic was not acceptable in her father's house. It was one of the earliest memories of her childhood, learning that she must hide and conceal and minimise this aspect of herself. Her mother told her quiet stories of the day she would go to Hogwarts and learn to do magic properly, in an orderly and dutiful way, not the wild and instinctive way she did it now. 

Rolling out of bed at last, Minerva gasped as the cold struck through her nightgown. She hastened over to the window and tugged the curtain. Before closing it completely, she looked down into the garden. It was striped dark grey and silver in the starlight, with enormous, wavering shadows that made a nonsense of the productive green space it was during the day.

The manse cat jumped up onto the stone wall between the garden and the tiny orchard, and sat still, tail twitching. Another cat jumped up beside her. They touched noses briefly, but that was all. Minerva watched them exist together, sharing the same space without any need of rules or obligations. They owed each other nothing, and simply allowed their self-contained bodies to connect for a moment. Minerva was envious of their freedom to explore the serious world of the night, and to be themselves and walk however they wished. 

She twitched the curtains shut and returned to bed. Envy was a sin, she knew, and one she must work harder to overcome. She would have to try to complete her tasks tomorrow with greater zeal, with a more willing heart. Her mother said that one found fulfilment in service; Minerva would hope for that tomorrow.

>>>>

Minerva hadn't been sure what to expect when she changed into her animagus form for the first time. She'd studied the transformative techniques, the incantation, the mental stages of each layer of the change, but they were all to do with the practicalities of how to manage the change. She'd never considered the reality of what the change was. 

Studying was easy for Minerva. She would lose herself in words and ideas, and she didn't notice the chill of the classrooms she practiced in, or her hunger as she sat reading the library. When Dumbledore spoke of the Animagus transformation, she hadn't thought of the new world it would open for her to explore, but the challenge of the transformation itself. To change herself at the cellular level, to have the discipline and commitment to train her brain and body; that was what excited her. When Professor Dumbledore asked his advanced Transfiguration students to choose a special project to work on, Minerva did not hesitate to choose the Animagus transformation.

Minerva had been caught up in the transformation as a series of mental and physical steps. As she held the mandrake leaf under her tongue, she reflected on how the usual anti-spasmodic effect of the leaf worked alongside the slow tightening of the muscles and nerves ready for transformation. She considered the nature of consciousness while learning to separate hers from the functioning of her body. She thought about transfiguration as the rearrangement of matter and energy, but she hadn't thought about how this cell-deep transformation would affect her.

The first time she opened her eyes as a cat, she was flooded with new ideas and information, and she found the deepness of the change almost overwhelming. She had to force herself to stay there, crouched in her new shape on the floor, breathing deeply and making herself deliberately reflect on the new world she found. She hadn't been expecting the physical and emotional changes to be so profound, and she had to fight her instincts to change back in a panic.

Minerva now saw the world in new shades, colder blues and purples, and she narrowed her eyes against the strength of the light. She could feel, now, in a new and proprietorial way, the keenness of feline sight in the dark shadows. She could smell the faint mint and leather scent that Dumbledore favoured, overlaid with something else, like a reek of nervous sweat. She sniffed at the distinct odour of mouse, a smell she was sure she'd never before been able to identify so distinctly and with such a predatory instinct.

Even the air seemed alive to Minerva, and her whiskers twitched with the new sensory information streaming in. The sudden amplification of touch in the breeze over her whiskers made her shiver slightly, and then fluff up her fur before subsiding. She suddenly had a detailed sense map of her surroundings in a way she never had before; the very eddies of the air around a nearby chair were clearly sensed. Her hearing was sharper too, and she could hear the distant shrieks of high-pitched laughter, while the room around her was quiet. 

Hearing the noise of her peers reassured Minerva. She was still herself, as sharp and alert as ever. The world seemed richer and full of detail around her, but her responses seemed simpler and less contrived. She felt free, happy, and without any of the complicated overthinking she was prone to. Her mind processed all the changes with her customary quickness, and it was a smaller shock when she felt herself start to purr with satisfaction, or even smugness. 

She stretched, testing the unfamiliar range of movements and the way her body fitted together. Her tail caught her eye, and she whirled round once, catching it in her paws, before she realised what she'd done. Her sharp ears caught the faintest huff of laughter from Dumbledore, and she swiftly sat up. She would save the exploration of this new freedom for some time without an audience, particularly not her professor.

Turning back into her human form was easy, although the cool tone of her eyesight persisted till she blinked once or twice. She was still herself, though she felt that she'd seen a whole new world. She looked at Dumbledore, and he was back to being vague and difficult to read. There was no trace of amusement or nervousness on his face, though she'd sensed both so clearly in her cat form. 

"Congratulations, Miss McGonagall," he said with his usual heartiness. "An extremely successful transformation, with no problems whatsoever."

"Thank you, Professor," she replied. She volunteered no other information. She wasn't about to share her experience, as inward and revelatory as it had been, with someone she wasn't sure would understand. Dumbledore was a clever, driven man, and he clearly served the school well, but she couldn't help but feel there was a little too much calculation in his caring. She had been raised in a family that prioritised service; she could find nothing to criticise in that, but she thought she detected insincerity in his, just as she felt resignation in hers. She would keep her thoughts and feelings to herself today, especially when she wasn't quite sure what they were yet.

"Since I assume you are itching to try the transformation again, without an audience, I shall leave you to it," he said, with that damnable twinkle in his eye. She merely nodded. "I trust you remember our emergency arrangement, should you encounter difficulties or get stuck," he continued.

"I have not forgotten," she said. She wanted him to leave, at once; she had no intention of giving in to her urge to explore her new instincts and insights in front of him. Her dignity was her shield.

"A delightful adventure," he said, turning to leave at last. He shot a smile over his shoulder and she couldn't help but smile back. Dumbledore might be infuriatingly, almost affectedly, eccentric, but she would never have succeeded in the transformation without him. He left the room, and Minerva barely waited until she heard his footsteps fade before shrinking once more, letting the deepest of all transfigurations settle into her. As she bunched her muscles and sprang onto one of the desks, she could feel unaccustomed joy and delight in her new abilities. She had done it; she was an Animagus now, and her satisfaction in success was mixed up with the new delights of life as a cat. She extended her new claws and dug them into the desk, feeling simple happiness at the sensation of wood splitting beneath her paws. 

>>>>

Minerva opened the door cautiously, wand out. Even in the Castle itself, she was still wary. Albus stood before her, looking uncharacteristically serious. He smiled and his twinkle set back in as he took in her preparations.

"Do you feel the need to check me for polyjuice, Minerva?" he asked.

"You forget I went to school with Alastor Moody," she said. "He might have gone a bit far, but vigilance hurts no one."

She let him take a seat by the fire while she made the tea. On reflection, she put a bottle of whisky on the tray too, with two tumblers, and levitated it all to the small coffee table. There was comfortable silence as they helped themselves to tea. Minerva didn't offer to help, but she kept a close eye on him as he used his withered hand to shift his cup. She was sure he noticed her care, but said nothing either.

"It's nearly time," he said.

"I know," said Minerva. "I assumed this wasn't a social visit."

He looked around the room, and Minerva wondered what he saw. Her set of rooms had always reminded her of her bedroom at the manse, right down to the view of one of the House Elves vegetable gardens. She wasn't sure who had allocated it to her first, but it even had a window perfect for a cat to slip in and out.

"Neither of us has ever been much for society, have we?" Albus asked. "I still remember the day you first attained the Animagus transformation. An excellent piece of work, it was, and still is."

Minerva smiled reminiscently. That day was long in the past now, but she could still remember the feeling of her first moments, of being overwhelmed and then joyful.

"I have often wondered," Albus continued, "what the transformation is like."

Minerva considered. She had no need of dignity to shield her now. She had known Albus for many long years, had worked for him and with him, and she had seen his various masks from many, many angles. The man on the inside was a complicated mix of all of them, one that she didn't like very much sometimes, but one that she couldn't help but love as a brother.

"It's not just a transfiguration of the body and its organs," she said. "That's what I thought, when I did it. It goes deep, though, and the Animagus form is not quite an animal shape on the human concerned. When I change, the cat has no sense of duty. She cannot be put under an obligation. She is free, and I am free too." She paused and looked down at her hands. "I don't know if I can explain it clearly, but my cat form unquestionably saved me more than once."

Albus nodded, as if he understood that she wasn't talking about physical saving. Perhaps he did. Perhaps he would have been happier if he'd had a less complicated place to escape to; no animal form would be able to understand the long burdens of guilt and resignation.

"I sometimes regret I did not pursue the transformation," Albus said. Minerva poured them both a whisky and they sipped in reflective silence. Albus raised the last bit in his glass. "I'm glad you are here with me at the end of all things, Minerva."

"Surely not," Minerva said. "An adventure, and we shall end with happily ever after." She understood what he wanted from her, though, and she lifted her glass to him in reply. "I'm ready, and my heart is willing, even joyful, to find satisfaction in serving, after you are gone." 

They tossed back their drinks and Minerva pretended not to see the spasm of pain that shook him in its aftermath. She escorted him to the door and watched him walk down the hallway slowly, as if the Castle itself was lending him its strength. Perhaps it was. Perhaps, when she was Headmistress, it would do the same for her. She was ready to face that, and find fulfilment in it.


End file.
